Concept Car of the Week: Alfa Romeo Giulia 1600 Sport (1965)

Autodelta produced 112 Alfa Romeo TZs between 1963 and 1965. The TZ abbreviation – for Tubulare Zagato – refers to the innovative lightweight spaceframe chassis that kept the weight at an impressive 660kg and assured great performance both on the road and on the track. Out of those desirable TZs, Zagato bodied the vast majority but two of the chassis were also handed to rival carrozzerias Bertone and Pininfarina.

Better Place Electric Car visitor centre opens

Better Place have opened a visitor centre in Israel to demonstrate their battery swap technology for electric cars Last October we wrote about a start-up company in Israel – Better Place – that had a new way forward for electric cars by taking the purchase of battery packs out of the equation, and was developing a system for ‘Battery Swap’ stations where electric car owners could drive in and swap their battery pack for a fully-charged one in a few minutes. That story first brought to our attention our favourite quote of last year – by Nissan boss Carlos Ghosn – who said “A hybrid is like a mermaid: if you want a fish, you get a woman; if you want a woman, you get a fish.” Which probably explained why Nissan – and its partner Renault – got involved with Better Place. Better Place aims to address the main concerns of electric car drivers by making the battery packs in electric cars ‘swappable’.

2012 Lamborghini Aventador completes a mad trio of supercars headed to market

If you thought the struggling global economy or high fuel prices might be hurting the world's supply of top-notch supercars, think again. Since March, AutoWeek editors have taken the wheel of not one, not two, but three of the most insane superperformers on the planet: the McLaren MP4-12C, the Ferrari FF, and most recently, the Lamborghini Aventador LP700-4. We see a few common threads: lots of lightweight aluminum and carbon-fiber materials, engines punching out more than 590 hp, automated-manual gearboxes, and prices that put them up against the average price of a three-bedroom home in most markets.